Saturday, January 29, 2011

Ar-Riddah (Apostasy) - Question & Answer 4

Mat Bihi Saturday, January 29, 2011

To how many category did the ^ulama’ classified the expressions and explain the meaning of that?

Al-^ulama’ classified the expressions into two categories:

adh-dhahir and as-sarih. Adh-dhahir has according to language two meanings or more, but is more used in one of these meanings [than the others]. When a person utters an expression that is dhahir, he is not charged with kufr; unless, one knows about what the person meant by that saying.

On the other hand, as-sarih does not have any other explanation. The one who utters a sarih statement which is kufr, commits kufr. He is not asked about what he meant and no explanation can be accepted from him; unless, he does not know the meaning of this sarih saying, because he may think that its meaning is other than what he said. In this case, this saying with regards to him does not carry the standing of as-sarih.